Maria Mendes and Ensemble Darcos
Visiones
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Cyclically, we are buffeted by oscillating winds, where the roots that bind us to our worldview seem to come loose. We oscillate like a boat adrift, with no north, no wind and no tide. It's a path of uncertainty, of oblique shadows, full of visions and spectres. How far are we travelling? Federico García Lorca (1898-1936), the greatest figure in 20th century Castilian lyric, tried to respond to this feeling through a body of work impregnated with poetic-musical visions of passion and death, premonitions and disillusionment, in a disconcerting rapture unparalleled in the history of Western poetry. An example of this is Tamarit's Divan, a collection of 21 poems written during the summers of 1931-34 at Huerta de San Vicente, his family holiday home on the outskirts of Granada. The poems are divided into 12 gazeis and 9 casidas, poetic forms from Granada's Arab heritage (divan is the term for a collection of gazeis and casidas).
Visiones is a new song cycle by Nuno Côrte-Real (1971), based on seven poems from Lorca's Divan: the gazesis Del amor imprevisto, Del amor desesperado, Del amor maravilloso and Del niño muerto; and casidas De la mujer tendida; De la muchacha dorada and De las palomas oscuras. As a unifying motif, the theme from the 1st movement of Beethoven's trio op. 97 (1770-1827), an idée fixe that runs through the elegiac atmosphere of the cycle, bringing it to a close. Likewise, two chorales by J.S. Bach (1685-1750), points of reference on the obscure horizon of Lorca's lyric, in the composer's own words. They are poetic-musical spectres in which dignity and its absence, love and death, go beyond lyrical surrealism, in a way of stony appeasement.
On Côrte-Real's creative horizon was the kaleidoscopic voice of Maria Mendes (1985), an acclaimed figure in European jazz. The only Portuguese female artist to receive an American Grammy nomination, in 2020 she won the prestigious EDISON Jazz Awards. Lorca's interview with Luis Bagaría, editor of Madrid's El Sol, is famous, in which he says he favours “the poor, those who have nothing”, and that there is no way of avoiding compassion for “the persecuted, the gypsy, the black, the Jew, the Moor that we all carry within us”. Visiones is a long enquiry into life. The boat has left, but the destination is uncertain.
Cycle of songs by Nuno Côrte-Real written for the voice of Maria Mendes, in absolute premiere
I. Preludio
II. Del amor maravilloso
II. Del niño muerto
IV. Coral I
V. De la mujer tendida
VI. Del amor desesperado
VII. De las palomas oscuras
VIII. Coral II
IX. De la muchacha dorada
X. Del amor imprevisto
XI. Posludio
Artists
Maria Mendes, voice
Nuno Côrte-Real, musical direction and synthesiser
Süse Ribeiro, sound design
Ensemble Darcos
Francisco Lima Santos, violin
Paula Carneiro, violin
Reyes Gallardo, viola
Filipe Quaresma, cello
Domingos Ribeiro, double bass
Sónia Pais, flute
Marco Fernandes, percussion
Helder Marques, piano
Ana Ester Santos, harp
Information
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“la Caixa” Foundation · BPI Bank is Patron of the 32nd edition of the Alcobaça Music Festival